Black Werewolves: Books 1–4

by Gaja J. Kos

  But despite his exceptional control, Rose knew her father was unable to contain the energy within him.

  Whatever the Vedmaks were doing, they were forcing the currents of magic to lash out, repeatedly hitting the barrier.

  They were making Bogdan harm himself.

  Rose felt a snarl growing in her throat and realized it was her father’s voice that sounded in the room. Cold sweat trickled down his temples, and the tight feeling in her own gut told her the few shields Bogdan had managed to put up were about to fall.

  Powerful, opulent magic that wanted to protect its carrier lashed out from his core in angry, untamed currents. It pooled just beneath the surface of Bogdan’s skin, thrashing against the iron circles which only grew colder, fed by the sheer strength of the pressure. Their icy touch burned his torso and bit into his limbs.

  Rose felt her father fighting for consciousness, fighting against the body’s natural response to save him before the pain shattered his mind. His eyes closed involuntarily, and along with Bogdan, she lost her own sense of time.

  When the Vedmak’s eyes opened again, the room was filled with dark shapes that slowly came into focus.

  Twenty-one figures, all of them Bogdan’s brethren, filled the space between the chained man and the entrance, their hoods thrown back. Twenty-one pairs of eyes focused solely on him.

  He met their hostile gazes, each and every one of them, even as he battled the daze that had once again begun to spread across his sight.

  Rose’s breath hitched. It was impossible…

  Bogdan wasn’t doing this as some sort of final stand, an act of defiance.

  He knew he was about to die. He already had the dignity of not breaking under the pressure and pain his brethren brought upon him. There was no need for him to endure more.

  Her father could have allowed the darkness to take him, could have made that final step into death, knowing he had kept the woman he loved and his daughter safe.

  But he hadn’t.

  Because Bogdan was doing this for her.

  He was giving her an opportunity to see his captors. His executioners. The people Bogdan knew wished to decide his daughter’s fate just as they had his.

  Somewhere, in another reality, tears flowed down her cheeks. But in the iron cell, her gaze were focused on the twenty-one faces, each trait writing itself in her memory with painful detail. She would carry them to her grave.

  Bogdan exhaled a silent warning to his yet unborn daughter. Even if it filled her with sorrow, she knew she needed to comply. Knew what to expect.

  The Vedmaks, without averting their gazes from their captive’s face, began feeding their magic into the air. Not merely the potent auras emanating from their bodies, but a solid, saturated wall that could never be cracked.

  Blood splashed at the back of Bogdan’s throat, and he vomited it all on the floor, his body shaking as the sanguine fluid kept rising from his lungs and stomach.

  Magic rippled in his flesh, throwing itself at every inch of his skin in a frenzy as it searched for a way to let itself loose. But it couldn’t touch the foul energy that dripped in the air and pressed against the chained Vedmak, taunting the man’s power. Couldn’t dispel it.

  A cry exploded from his mouth. It was a cry filled with rage, anguish at his helplessness. But also a cry of rebellion.

  He had withstood all they had done. He had kept his family safe.

  The iron circles dug into his skin, and Rose’s father fell silent.

  It was time.

  He offered himself to the pain, embracing the self-destruction his magic promised. At the very last minute, Rose blocked herself from experiencing everything just as he had wanted her too.

  She wasn’t as strong as her father.

  If she was to meet a similar fate, she only hoped she would find it within herself to not break.

  Even through the shields erected between her senses and Bogdan’s soul, she felt the agony as his magic, unable to expand, turned on itself instead.

  Turned against him.

  And burned through every cell of his body.

  Chapter 22

  Warm tears were streaming down Rose’s cheeks when she opened her eyes and found herself in the familiar layout of the small New York hotel room. She stared at the ceiling, ignoring the dark figure that sat next to her on the bed and the flash of red hair in the background. Her heart was a shredded mess, as if a thousand talons had fallen upon it, every breath a new battle that she might lose.

  The grief that had never had room to surface stuck to her skin. Heavy and thick, it weighed her down, wanting to submerge her in the love and regret flowing through her veins—to drown her in the loss of someone she hadn’t truly known.

  What Bogdan had fought to do…

  “He knew,” she breathed at last, sinking deeper into the pillow. “My father knew who I would someday become…”

  Masculine fingers brushed against the side of her face, and she turned to see Veles staring down at her, a silent question written in the deep olive hue of his eyes—almost as strong as the pain resting within them. They never could distance themselves from what the other felt. Being separated hadn’t changed that.

  She shuddered, willing the tears to stop. She glanced over to where Serafina was standing—the Koldunya’s skin pale, her fingers fiddling with the antique necklace—then turned her gaze back on Veles.

  For a moment, she allowed herself to forget the past months, to forget that night in her apartment when everything had fallen apart, and instead drew strength from the love she still had—from the love she saw written on the sculptured planes of the god’s face.

  “Bogdan knew the Vedmaks would eventually try to hunt me down… He—” Rose’s voice broke. The caresses bestowed upon her by the god’s fingers intensified yet became gentler at the same time. “Before he died, he showed me their faces. He looked into the eyes of every one of his captors, giving me the opportunity to observe, to memorize…. So that when the time came, I’d be prepared.”

  “How could he have known?” Veles asked, his touch halting on her cheek.

  She pulled herself up and caught his hand as it fell down on the mattress. She rubbed her thumb across the side of his palm, the familiarity of it scaring away the chill that sent tremors down her limbs. “Maybe he didn’t,” she said softly, the warmth of his skin becoming a lifeline. “But he knew I would be powerful. Perhaps he also knew that the desirable, seducing, silver-tongued lord of the underworld had a taste for the descendants of Mokoš. Knew that the god would be unable to pass up the opportunity to be with someone as strong as his Vedmak blood made me.”

  Veles smiled at that, his fangs shooting out for the minutest of moments for only her to see. She squeezed his hand, a small smile lingering on her lips despite the hollowness she felt growing in her chest.

  “I don’t believe Bogdan had foreseen that I would end up being the caretaker of spirits. But if Ileana had told him about you… Maybe he hoped that you might someday enter my life and show me his soul.” She sniffed. “I guess it was a shot in the dark. A final fuck you to the Vedmaks. And it worked…” She shook her head. “It worked.”

  Veles leaned over, cupping her face with one hand while the other remained entwined with hers. “I have no idea if I should be flattered or appalled that your father bet on me living up to my reputation. And, well, bet that his daughter would find me irresistible…”

  She took a sharp inhale, arched an eyebrow, then burst out laughing. The tears she had tried to control ran down her face, and she buried her head in the nook of his shoulder. The god’s arms wrapped around her, loving and safe, and in the distance, she heard a relieved laugh escape Serafina’s lips.

  New York was still humming below them even as the night grew, an entity with its own life, oblivious and free from the individuals’ struggles. Veles, Serafina, and Rose were sitting on the narrow hotel bed, open boxes of spring rolls scattered across the mattress.

  When Serafina had slippe
d away to get the much-needed supply of food, Rose had used the minutes to convince Veles the excursion into the underworld hadn’t compromised her energy. He had objected at first, not wanting to put her under any additional strain, but she knew the uncertainty of her power’s state was gnawing at him. Besides, she herself craved to feel its familiarity.

  Although she hadn’t dared to bring it out to the surface completely in the god’s proximity, she allowed it to swirl inside her, traveling from her core to her limbs and breathing life into the gold flecks of her midnight blue eyes. She didn’t need to see it to know there was nothing but pure, golden light resting inside her depths.

  The strenuous sessions of acupuncture and her regular physical training seemed to have paid off, ameliorating her body to the point where her own strength could maintain the needed balance unless the exposure to Veles’ energy was too grave.

  Once she began, it had taken her a while to convince him there was no damning change lurking somewhere deep within her. But in the end, the dark-haired god saw reason. And he stayed.

  That single confirmation meant more than she could say. The god trusted her. And he didn’t fear her power.

  After what she had seen through Bogdan’s memories, merely knowing that people weren’t running away from her began to melt the ice inside Rose’s chest.

  She was part Vedmak.

  Her father’s brethren were, in a twisted way, her own.

  She wasn’t entirely certain if she could blame anybody for turning their back against her because of it, but she knew just as well how that rejection would sting.

  Though the rational part of her was aware that Veles’ reasons for putting distance between them weren’t linked directly to her heritage, there was a small, pestering voice inside her that wanted to convince her otherwise. More than anything, she was glad she didn’t have to deal with that, on top of everything else.

  By the time Serafina returned, a sense of normalcy had crept back into Rose’s mind. She wasn’t in a state where she could live through being rejected again.

  Although the uneasiness in her stomach as the sensations of her father’s death continued to swirl dangerously in her core, she was famished. She bit into another spring roll, savoring the moment as best as she could. The three were silent as they ate—although she didn’t fail to notice that Veles’ eyes came to rest upon her when he thought she wasn’t watching. More than a few times.

  She picked up another spring roll to keep herself busy. Her mind was divided between what she had seen through the memories etched into Bogdan’s soul and by what she yearned for. The embrace she had shared with the god after her return from the underworld still warmed her cheeks. The fact that she hadn’t wanted him to leave only added fuel to the fire.

  He wasn’t hers.

  But seeing him half stretched across the foot of the bed, wrapped in thoughts of his own, she knew she would never stop missing him.

  Never stop loving him, either.

  She had accepted it before. Then tossed the notion away. Rinse and repeat.

  It was easier without the god in her line of sight. Easier to convince herself that she would move on, even if all of those things were true. But his presence reminded her of how devastatingly, utterly alone she felt without him.

  Wiping her hands on a piece of toilet-paper-turned-napkin, she distanced herself from that part of her heart and focused on another. Even if the mere thought of it was just as difficult. Speaking, even harder.

  She turned towards Serafina, catching the Koldunya mid-bite. “When you told me about my father, you said he was chained…”

  The redhead nodded and finished her meal. In Rose’s peripheral vision, Veles stirred, minute muscles stiffening with attention.

  “But you didn’t mention that the chains were designed to contain his magic.”

  Serafina blinked. “The tales we’ve been told said Bogdan had been in a spelled chamber which negated his own powers…”

  “He was,” Rose replied and pursed her lips. The sensations of the chamber resonated in her mind, the phantom effects reverberating through her body. “But it hadn’t been enough. He was put into some sort of armor made of iron circles. And the chains were fashioned the same way…”

  Thick silence fell between them. The Koldunya was slowly shaking her head, a hint of disbelief lining her features.

  “That—, I—,” she stammered, rubbing her hands against her face before running her fingers through the voluminous strands of hair that fell down her back. “That wasn’t supposed to exist.”

  “What wasn’t?” Veles intervened. Something predatory seeped to the surface of his eyes, making him every inch of the immortal, powerful force he was.

  “The Kolduny have heard that our brethren achieved building chains that were saturated with a kind of…negative magic, for lack of a better word. Because circles—”

  “—are traditionally used to protect oneself from evil,” the god jumped in, his face even harder.

  “Or to surround it,” Serafina cast an apologetic glance in Rose’s direction.

  Jaw tense, Rose swallowed. “They used talismans of protection to surround my father’s magic?”

  The Koldunya bit her lip, a gentle frown forming between her brows as she said, “They must have manipulated them into single-sided artifacts. Every Vedmak’s power is something that is considered evil by nature. An ignorant concept, but most of them find it pleasing, actually. A circle would work against it instinctively…”

  “So they had to shape them into something that would work as a barrier, not a beacon.” Rose exhaled, remembering how that unusual armor burned Bogdan’s skin with its icy surface. She understood what the Vedmaks had done, and it made her want to taste their blood on her tongue even more. Thunderous darkness swarmed in her core, but she pushed it away. Not yet. “Rings of iron weren’t enough. Negative magic—you mean the kind that repels its like? As if you tried to force the same poles of two magnets together?” A nod from the Koldunya, though Rose barely registered it. “The circles created a ward, and the magnetic field of the energy within them kept pushing my father’s magic back into his body. Instead of protecting Bogdan from the outside threat, the power destroyed itself… And my father with it.”

  A shiver ran down her skin, a different kind of realization sinking into the pit of her stomach. Her chest welled with dread, but also with a strange kind of relief at the same time.

  There was a silver lining, after all.

  “My father’s magic may have manifested differently, but I still carry it within me.” She remembered Sander’s remark, how her energy felt similar. The Koldun had sensed Bogdan’s heritage nestled within Rose’s own power—and she had felt it as well. “The armor will work on me the same as on my father. If they trap me in it, the Vedmaks won’t have to slaughter my pack in order to get to me.”

  A silent fire burned in Veles’ eyes. “Blocking who you are would inadvertently block the bond of The Dark Ones.”

  “And nothing would stand between them and my death.”

  “Shit,” Serafina whispered from Rose’s side.

  Rose looked at her friend, her lips pulled into a tight smile. “At least my pack will be safe…”

  It was the truth, but Rose could see Serafina wasn’t as eager to admit defeat. The Koldunya reached over and wrapped her delicate fingers around Rose’s arm. “They’ll still have to go through all of us first.”

  A sob escaped Rose’s lips before she could stop it, involuntary tears burning in the back of her eyes. “I can’t ask that of you.”

  “You don’t have to.” Serafina smiled, her own eyes now carrying a glistening sheen. “If the infallible lord of the underworld said I’m powerful, then you have all that power at your disposal. Though I guess I’ll need some training before I can be of use…”

  Biting back a cry, Rose leaned over and embraced her friend.

  She remembered the shock that had gripped the witch in Tignes, the dread of taking a life…
And yet, the redhead was willing to do it again. For her.

  “Thank you,” Rose whispered, wiping the tears as she pulled back from the embrace. In the corner of her vision, Veles shifted on the bed.

  “I will stand by you as well, Rosalind,” his voice flowed through the room, lined with a heaviness he tried to conceal but failed. “If you’ll have me.”

  The words made her pause. She pulled her legs beneath her body and turned towards the god. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  A shadow she had seen before crossed his face—that inexplicable strain of darkness that had never truly surfaced when they had still been together. Something had changed.

  The god pushed back a strand of his black hair, not meeting her eyes, and began to speak.

  Chapter 23

  “The power will call to you. It will try to overpower your own will,” Morana said, sipping on a glass of scotch she procured from the cabinet at the far end of the room.

  Veles licked his lips as the opulent smell of the drink filled the air but understood the goddess couldn’t be swayed. His alcohol tolerance was as high as the werewolves’, yet in that moment, it held no weight. Morana cared for him and knew better than any member of the former pantheon what a mistake might cost him. She intended to keep him focused, his mind sharp as the first true—and at the same time, hardest—step of their training began.

  She placed the glass on the table next to the crackling fireplace and shrugged off her cloak when the room finally grew warm. Perhaps for the first time in ages.

  “You have kept this part of you locked away for millennia,” she said as she straightened the burgundy fabric and turned to meet his eyes. “It will strive to be released.”

  He inhaled, observing the calmness of Morana’s features. She had done it before. Without guidance. But her power had been young. His, on the other hand, was already a steady, strong flame, even if it still seemed to grow hotter with each passing century. Controlling a suppressed part of that force was a task few would be willing to take.